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Opinion Contributor

Conservatives at a crossroads: Harold Hill vs. William F. Buckley

Rather than preach an ideology, Buckley focused on fusing factions, the authors say.

By SCOT FAULKNER and JONATHAN RIEHL | 11/21/12 4:32 AM EST

The GOP’s trouncing has triggered a wave of “soul searching” typical in its post-election timing, but more significant in its impact for our politics and for the conservative movement — if there is one. We think not. The conservative crisis of 2012 is not just a crisis of messaging; it is a crisis of conscience.

The cast of characters now presenting themselves as conservative leaders bear nothing in common with the intellectual cadre that brought the movement to prominence in the 1960s and 1970s. For months we watched in horror as a parade of Harold Hill hucksters mouthed empty tea party phraseology, followed the advice of Dick Morris and Karl Rove, and parroted Frank Luntz’s magic words — all the while selling a boy’s band that simply does not exist. Their polls, their news, their understanding of America, are a façade. The people of River City — the conservative base — were willingly sold a bill of goods. They got their reality check on Nov. 6.

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Like the traveling salesman from “The Music Man,” the right’s media echo chamber has captivated the townsfolk. It is full of rapid-fire talkers, fearless pugilists and moralistic re-enforcers. To be clear, media access and its persuasive power have always been central to the conservative cause. But how far we have come from the days when William F. Buckley, Jr. hosted a PBS program called “Firing Line,” where conservatives of all stripes, liberal intellectuals and policymakers debated issues in depth. Today the conservative base prefers the endless recitation of things it already believes.

In a larger sense, the problem extends far beyond the “dumbing down” of a noble policy movement into cartoonish diatribes mouthed by one-dimensional personalities. It’s not about bad messaging. It’s the lack of any coherent framework or foundation for that message.

The movement, once a coalition of cold warriors, traditionalists and free marketeers, no longer exists. Buckley did not preach an ideology; he helped maintain a fusion of different factions. The key players, and candidates, came from very different camps but were united in a fundamental understanding of the limited role of government and the power of the individual. These groups often disagreed. But their differences were worked out through reasoned debate and exchange, guided by a 300-year provenance dating to John Locke and earlier.

Readers' Comments (32)

Somehow, I doubt that Buckley, were he alive today, would qualify as a conservative. Or Ronald Reagan, for that matter. They were far too reasonable.

Today's "conservatives" fight tooth and nail against raising tax rates when the Federal government borrowed or created out of whole cloth 40% of every dollar it spent in Fiscal Year 2010, and on the close order of 40% of FY 2011 spending, and is predicted to continue borrowing and creating money ad infinitum long into the foerseeable future, without ever suggesting what reductions in the unpaid for 40% thy are willing to make.

Today's "conservatives" voted for the security state legislation that created the TSA, that allows for indefinite detention and/or extrajudicial killing of American citizens at the whim of the president. They voted to allow government to conduct warrant-less wiretapping of American citizens. I cannot imagine Buckley or Reagan approving of either.

Oh, BTW, the GOP was not "trounced". They got out-organized by the Community-Organizer-in-Chief. President Obama and his minions were able to drag or bribe enough of his voters to the polls in the densely populated cities to offset the vote of anti-Obama voters in less populated areas, and many under-enthused potential Romney voters just stayed home. President Obama received something on the order of 7,500,000 fewer votes in 2012 (61,173,739) than in 2008 (69,498,516). This hardly qualifies as a trouncing, IMHO.

To me conservatism is a proactive recognition of the philosophical and theological underpinnings on which our nation was founded. Either those principles are true and are sacrosanct or they are not. If they are not then at most all we can do is fight and force a new basis on which a shared culture may be erected. If, however, those principles are true and are just, we must hold to them and repel and turn back whatever progressive mischief has been done – assuming it is not too late – but we cannot compromise on principles. For example, we cannot in the name of conservatism dialogue over millions of illegal aliens hoping to convince millions of other Hispanics who “share our values” to therefore reward us by joining the Republican party to help the establishment Republicans and their surrogates get elected to office and maintain positions of influence. For true conservatives, the extent to which our shared culture has come to an end is the real question with which to grapple. If it has, then much of the discussion is moot anyway.

Buckley may look like an intellectual compared to today's crop of yahoos on the right, but his views and those of his right-wing colleagues were at the core deeply anti-intellectual from the very beginning (see "God and Man at Yale"). He was never a real conservative, just a right-winger and it is from his appearance on the scene that the fundamental confusion between genuine conservatism as a political philosophy and mere right-wind ideology has grown until by now it has become total.

Scot Faulkner was Director of Personnel for Reagan-Bush 1980 and Chief Administrative Officer of the U.S. House of Representatives under Speaker Newt Gingrich. Jonathan Riehl, J.D., Ph.D., is a communications consultant for political campaigns and national nonprofit organizations.

Dear suckers,

Thanks for being another naive set of dupes for the American left. Thank you for following their wishes and turning your guns on us while the Democrats laugh their way to the ballot box. Democrats aren't winning by running against us. They're winning by running against you, the establishment. The American left is STILL blaming Ronald Reagan for the plight of the middle class. "Reagan's tax cuts", "trickle down economics" "Reagan's deregulation" Newt Gingrich may have got us the "Republican Revolution", but ultimitely failed to deliver on all of the "Contract With America". That coupled with his antics and personal baggage and antics, ultimitley damaged the Republican brand. The Democrats ran against George W Bush again and won. What do you think Obama's "Forward" was about? Who do you think he was talking about when he said "let's not go back to the policies that got us in to this mess", the Tea Party or George W. and the establishment Republican congress of the 2000's?

Yeah, a lot of the hard right wingers need to tone it down and lose the anger. But it's a little hard to make a principled argument for fiscal responsibility when your opponents keep throwing Reagan, H.W. and W. in your face. Instead of fighting back and challenging our opponents, you attack us.

I remember as a teenager religiously watching Buckley on Crossfire every Sunday morning.

I have lived my own life as a conservative, both fiscally and socially.

I do not particularly care for the current arc of "progress" as proposed by Democrats or worse yet, hardcore liberals.

But I will not ... WILL NOT ... reward the Republican party, as it is currently manifested, for their behaviour o'er the last decade or so and especially their rotten, obstructionist, behaviour the last four years. And I mourn the loss of deliberative progress these last four years due to Republicans placing the interests of their party over the interests of the United States of America.

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Conservatives pride themselves on resisting change, which is as it should be. But intelligent deference to tradition and stability can evolve into intellectual sloth and moral fanaticism, as when conservatives simply decline to look up from dogma because the effort to raise their heads and reconsider is too great.

--William F. Buckley, considered by many the father of modern conservative thought.

The problem is a simple one, and not at all addressed by this article. The problem is that the dreadfully misnamed "Libertarians" have invaded the GOP as they are incapable of being elected on their own, as they garner maybe 3% of the vote. There exists in that cadre a sort of single-minded cult-like zeal that trumps all other associations, the only "coalition" there is between the predatory robber baron types, and the gormless Ayn Randian "true believers".

Republicans are not "Conservatives" so much as pragmatists, and pragmatism has been hounded out the door, and will continue to be so long as people like Steve Forbes continues to hawk his snake oil prescriptions, and so long as the Paulian echo chamber continues to buy it. "Conservatism" is nothing more than a marketing ploy to get members of the GOP to identify with an ideology further to the right and away from the center.

You see, the Libertarians are not the answer, as is stated implicitly in this article, they are the driving force behind the echo chamber, and now that it has fallen into disrepute, they want to disassociate themselves from it, as if they can just say a thing and that will make it true.

Republicans are pragmatists, and while fiscally conservative, that is pretty much where the conservatism ends because above all else, Republicans are Americans founded on a proudly progressive foundation.

Trying to re-establish the feudal system is not pragmatic (though it is conservative by definition) because we already know what happens in the end, and it involves blood, guts, torches, and pointy things; not at all conducive to an orderly and productive society in which to raise future generations.

Scot Faulkner was Director of Personnel for Reagan-Bush 1980 and Chief Administrative Officer of the U.S. House of Representatives under Speaker Newt Gingrich. Jonathan Riehl, J.D., Ph.D., is a communications consultant for political campaigns and national nonprofit organizations.

How much you want to bet these clowns live in D.C.?

Right after Obama was elected the first time, the left made a transparent, organized effort to drive wedges in the Republican Party. I really thought we wouldn't be gullible enough to fall for this crap, but apparently the Faulkners and Riehls of our movement aren't only taking the bait, they're swallowing it hook, line and sinker. And they smugly tell us we're dumbed down.

The problem is a simple one, and not at all addressed by this article. The problem is that the dreadfully misnamed "Libertarians" have invaded the GOP as they are incapable of being elected on their own, as they garner maybe 3% of the vote. The only "coalition" there is between the predatory robber baron types, and the gormless Ayn Randian "true believers".

Republicans are not "Conservatives" so much as pragmatists, and pragmatism has been hounded out the door, and will continue to be so long as people like Steve Forbes continues to hawk his "Federalist" snake oil, and so long as the Paulian echo chamber continues to buy it.

You see, the Libertarians are not the answer, as is stated implicitly in this article, they are the driving force behind the echo chamber, and now that it has fallen into disrepute, they want to disassociate themselves from it, as if they can just say a thing and that will make it true.

Republicans are pragmatists, and while fiscally conservative, that is pretty much where the conservatism ends because above all else, Republicans are Americans founded on a proudly progressive foundation.

Thank you.

The public is still voting their pocketbook and the Loser-tarians are hawking more tax cuts and more deregulation and blaming the "Christian Right". If people like the authors of this piece (of garbage) ever got out of their ivory towers, they'd realize that a lot of people who vote Democrat, especially in tight swing states, are regular church goers.

It's still the economy, stupid Loser-tarians and establishment Republicans.

I went from leaning liberal to leaning conservative because of William F. Buckley. His arguments for conservative government were so well laid out that they were nearly impossible to refute and sold me.

However, there isn't one moron on Fox news or conservative talk radio that is doing anything to continue my progression to the right and it has come to a complete standstill since Mr. Buckley passed.

The GOP needs to find a smart leader to kick the tea party out of the GOP, just like Mr. Buckley did to the John Birch Society in the '60's.

First of all, thanks to the authors of this piece for a serious attempt to think about the problems afflicting their movement and their party. We Democrats spent much of the 1980s in a similar effort, and I know from experience that it's not easy--- or pleasant.

I have a lot of sympathy for the argument they make here. Certainly Mr. Buckley and the writers and thinkers he brought together at "National Review"--- from William Rusher and Garry Wills to James Burnham and Jeffrey Hart--- would be appalled at the anti-intellectual drift of contemporary conservatism. These men believed that reason was on the side of conservative values, and they had no use for the kind of philosophical primitivism that characterizes today's Right.

Still, it seems to me that the authors evade a crucially important issue here. It is true that Mr. Buckley effected a fusion of conservative sects. But this fusion was, ultimately, purely tactical. He realized that the Right had a common enemy--- the New Deal state and the liberal agenda it sought to enact here and abroad--- and he counseled cooperation in the battle against it. What he did not do was resolve the theoretical conflicts that underlay this tactical confluence. The philosophical issues among Cold Warriors, traditionalists, and Free Marketeers--- as the authors gloss Buckley's conservative coalition--- remained open. Conceptual space abhors a vacuum, and over time today's "conservatives" rushed in to fill the vacancy. Cold Warriors, who always included a large number of hard-bitten realists, morphed into the neo-conservatives, who trumpeted democratic idealism instead. The traditionalists were largely replaced by theocratic reactionaries, and the Free Marketeers became supply-side zealots.

Whatever its tactical successes--- and they were many--- of Buckley's fusionist approach, its philosophical looseness sowed the seeds of today's conservative crack-up. What the movement desperately needs is not fusion, but synthesis--- a careful working out of the many aporias that divide its constituent sects. I don't myself think this is ultimately possible--- the fissures, in my humble opinion, run too deep--- but it sure would be fun to watch. Maybe this is a task to which our authors could commit themselves.

Excellent commentary - although I'm not sure about conservatism as a mood (maybe a bad mood?).

I'm a Democrat, and consider myself generally liberal - but I recognize that there have been excesses on both sides. The social welfare state we had from the 60's to the 90's was counterproductive, fostering generations of unproductive dependents. On the other hand, it makes no sense to declare that the government should have no role in keeping the population healthy, or that health insurance must be employer-based for some reason. In both cases, there is a happy medium in which government and private enterprise work together to enhance productivity.

So both views are necessary, and each serves as a check on the other. To flatly declare that only one side is valid, and that "libtards" must be suppressed, is not only totalitarian, but stupid.

I believe in REAL fiscal conservatism, but Republicans are not fiscal conservatives, some still say that , but that is certainly not what they do when they get into office. The debt tripled under Reagan. Romney's plan would have added 8 trillion to the debt in spending and loss of revenue. Bush spent money like a drunken sailor and the war profiteers (many now in the top 1%) made out like the bandits they are.

It would take a 180 degree turn around for the Republicans which will not happen, but I am going to say it anyway.

If you consider the government the enemy, you won't run it wisely. No company would hire you to work for them if you thought that company was your enemy.

Don't pander to extremists.

Put the good of your country over the republican party.

Your job discription is not to just say no.

Don't be socially intrusive.

You should be representing more than just big corporations and the wealthy.

As a leftist liberal, I found this article LONG overdue. I sincerely hope more "conservatives" get back on the substantive bandwagon this article highlights vs the theocratic, anti-science, ignorance celebrating "being stupid is cool" framework that defines the Republican party of 2012.

It could be added that conservatism is a methodology of attaining ends, not the ends themselves. It focuses on incremental and organic change, not overturning established norms and practices in society. It seeks the local and State solutions, rather than the DC-centric solution. It seeks fiscal prudence, rather than ends-justifies-the-means extravagance.

That is why it was possible for conservative think tanks in the 1980's and 90's to propose State-based, private insurance exchanges as an alternative to the Left's Single Payer takeover of health care.

That is why they proposed pollutant credit markets as opposed to draconian mandates from the EPA. (Which is also quite different from the Radical Right's science denial mania.)

This is the type of constructive conservatism that is successful at bringing improvements to American society. As opposed to the pseudo-libertarian radicalism that seeks to stifle any governance at all. Or the Left's addiction to bureaucracy and edict.

The American people will continue to desire that their issues be addressed. A constructive conservative approach can meet those needs, while at the same time safeguarding our basic freedoms from infringement.

Three cheers for Mr. Faulkner and Mr. Riehl. I long for the days when a bit of reason prevailed in the Republican Party — of which I was a member for five decades until the second Bush administration. When closed minded-nihilists like Limbaugh and Morris can be called conservatives, the term has no meaning. It isn't enough to be against the Democrats or the President. you have to be for something. Today Goldwater, Buckley, Reagan and others of their kind would all be dismissed as RINOs.

The GOP’s trouncing has triggered a wave of “soul searching” typical in its post-election timing, but more significant in its impact for our politics and for the conservative movement — if there is one. We think not. The conservative crisis of 2012 is not just a crisis of messaging; it is a crisis of conscience.